Demarcation of Forest Fire Risk Zones in Silent Valley National Park and the Effectiveness of Forest Management Regime

Wildfires pose a major threat to the forest ecosystems and species of the Western Ghats’ protected areas. Fires have also ravaged the Silent Valley National Park in the past. This study aimed to map the fire risk zones using the analytical hierarchy process (AHP) method, to assess the effect of each factor on the occurrence of fire and to assess the effectiveness of the forest management regime on fire prevention and mitigation. The causative factors selected for the risk modelling are land cover types, slope, aspect, normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), water ratio index (WRI), normalized difference water index (NDWI), proximity to the settlement, proximity to the road and proximity to the anti-poaching camp shed. AHP is utilized to calculate weights, and GIS is utilized to identify the risk zones. The area covered by the fire risk map is classified into five zones and was validated using the fire incidence data collected for the period 2002–2020. According to the study, 72% of all fires occur in areas categorized as high or very high risk on the prepared map. The result of the validation revealed that the AHP model is effective (with an AUC value of 78.79% for the training dataset and 77.64% for the validation dataset) in identifying the fire risk zones in Silent Valley National Park. The vast majority of fires in this region have been proven to be caused by human activity. This study confirmed that the forest management initiatives are effective in the core zone of the national park. The findings of this study will aid planners, managers and decision-makers in determining the location of fire lookout towers, installing sensors and constructing firebreaks, etc.